Posted
by
samzenpus
on Friday February 17, 2012 @06:23AM
from the here's-your-fold-bot dept.

Zothecula writes "Inspired by origami and children's pop-up books, Harvard engineers have pioneered a means of mass-producing bee-sized flying microrobots. The breakthrough mechanizes the already state-of-the art process of making Harvard's Mobee robots by hand, by mass producing flat assemblies by the sheet which can be folded and assembled in a single movement. The technique, which cunningly exploits existing machinery for making printed circuit boards, can theoretically be applied to a multitude of electromechanical machines."

An excellent video (and I do not use the term lightly) showing animations and video footage of the assembly of the Mobee...

echo^^

Harvard has filed numerous patent applications associated with the process, and is working with business to "identify disruptive applications in a range of industries."

While I'm sure there will be anti-patent people saying that since the process is "Inspired by origami and children's pop-up books" there's nothing novel or original in it, and prior art should invalidate their patents, for once I'm not sure I agree. I watched the video, and was inspired. Disruptive applications doesn't say the half of it!